Pats wary of Spiller breaking loose

Just two weeks into the season, Bills rookie running back C.J. Spiller has yet to have his NFL breakout game, but Patriots defensive lineman Ron Brace knows what Spiller is capable of.

The two were ACC foes when Spiller was at Clemson and Brace was at Boston College.

“There’s a bullet right there,” Brace said of Spiller, “so it’ll bring back some memories. He’s fast, really good quickness, he reads the blocks pretty good and as an outside runner he’s deadly. So you just have to watch him. He’s a weapon in every way, shape and form in the backfield.”

Spiller finished his four-year college career with 7,588 all-purpose yards, the second most in NCAA history. He and former USC running back Reggie Bush are the only college players with 3,000 yards rushing, 1,500 yards on kickoff returns, 1,000 yards receiving and 500 yards on punt returns. He had 21 touchdowns of 50 yards or more.

You can see why the Bills made Spiller a first-round draft choice (ninth overall) in April.

“I think he’s very dangerous,” Patriots coach Bill Belichick said. “You can see that any time he has his hands on the ball.”

Spiller had a solid preseason, rushing for 122 yards and three touchdowns, including a 31-yard scoring burst against the Colts. And with backfield mates Marshawn Lynch (ankle) and Fred Jackson (hand) hurting for much of camp, Spiller earned the start for Buffalo’s opener against Miami. It wasn’t quite a dazzling debut. Spiller carried seven times and gained just 6 yards.

“As we all know, preseason games are one level of intensity, one speed, and then when you hit the regular season, it goes up a notch,” Bills coach Chan Gailey said. “So when he got to the regular season, that first game he was just going extremely fast and I was probably unfair to throw him in there. He’s still going to be a dynamic player and he’s still going to make a lot of big plays for us in the future. We just need him to get going on a little slower pace than throwing him in there from the get-go.”

Lynch got the start last week against the Packers and led the team with 17 carries for 64 yards. Spiller ran the ball just once, for 3 yards, and had three receptions for 23 yards. He’s averaging 26.4 yards on seven kickoff returns.

“I’m just going to prepare the best way I can,” Spiller said this week when asked if he expects to be more involved in the offense this week against the Patriots at Gillette Stadium, “and whenever I’m called on Sunday, I’ve just got to be ready to go.”

Linebacker Tully Banta-Cain said the key to stopping Spiller is swarming him.

“On the film I see he breaks a tackle, but then somebody’s coming right after that tackle’s broken,” Banta-Cain said. “That’s the biggest thing — just corralling him and making sure he doesn’t have a lot of space to get free.”

The Bills have scored only 17 points in their two losses and are hoping a change at quarterback (former Harvard QB Ryan Fitzpatrick for Trent Edwards) can help stir things up. New England’s defenders expect Buffalo’s backfield — “a three-headed monster,” said Banta-Cain — to present a challenge.

“They’re all tough runners,” nose tackle Vince Wilfork said, “so we’ve got our hands full. Most of the time you get one good back or two good backs, but they really have three good backs that can run the ball really, really well. For us, it will be about getting back to basics, communication and executing.”

Lynch, who has been rumored to be on the trading block, was a 1,000-yard rusher in 2007 and 2008, but his production fell off significantly last season. After being suspended for the first three games of 2009, he finished with just 450 rushing yards. Jackson stepped in and led the Bills, rushing for 1,062 yards.

The Bills are averaging 3.6 yards a carry in 2010 and their rush offense currently ranks 23rd in the NFL.

In the season opener, the Bengals (25 carries, 87 yards) and Cedric Benson (15-43, 2.9 average) didn’t do much against the Patriots on the ground. The Jets rushed for 136 yards — 103 in the second half — on 32 carries. LaDainian Tomlinson averaged close to 7 yards on his 11 carries and had a long run of 31 yards that set up a third-quarter touchdown.

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